Hart: Rumors over UT president's job show poor timing

Updated 11:10 pm, Thursday, May 10, 2012

Strategically speaking, rumors that Gov. Rick Perry is trying to can University of Texas President Bill Powers could not have come at a worse time for our governor. It's Finals Week in Austin, which of course means there are no classes and bored students are looking for the tiniest reason possible to abandon their studies.

It arrived Wednesday night, on a silver platter, in the form of speculation on Texas Monthly senior editor Paul Burka's blog that Perry was conspiring to ax Powers. Facebook and Twitter exploded with entreaties for students to "Stand with Bill Powers" and saturate the board of regents with phone calls and letters. Who could study at a time like this?! There's something to protest!!!

In truth, the rumor has been making the rounds for over a year. The latest version was apparently sparked by Powers' expression of disappointment last week that the UT Board of Regents didn't raise tuition. This year, Perry has pressured his regents to keep tuition down - despite the legislature's $556 million cut to higher education funding in the current budget. Powers had the temerity to challenge Perry's political grand-standing, pointing out that the university needed extra tuition dollars to replace what the legislature had taken away. As Rep. Mike Villarreal pointed out, UT wouldn't need to saddle students and their families with extra tuition if the legislature had, oh, maybe, dipped into the Rainy Day Fund instead of slashing higher ed.

Would Perry really try to force out Powers simply for speaking his mind? Absolutely, and with pleasure. The two men have irreconcilable differences: Powers wants to transform the University of Texas at Austin into the premier public university in the U.S., and Perry wants to turn it into a cheap, second-rate degree mill.

UT in a vise

As I've written before, Perry unveiled a controversial blueprint for remaking Texas higher education at a May 2008 summit, where he introduced Texas' university regents to the ideas of Jeff Sandefer, an oil-and-gas investor and disgruntled former UT adjunct business professor. It was Sandefer who came up with the controversial Texas A&M University's "red-and-black report," which attempted to rate professors by how much money they "made" the university. Professors who taught giant lecture courses looked swell; those who conducted research with small groups of graduate students "lost" money. The simplistic system earned A&M a national black eye and an official rebuke from the Association of American Universities.

Last year, Perry began promising that Texas students will be able to earn an undergraduate degree for only $10,000. He conveniently neglects to mention that Texas students paid about that much before the legislature – at his urging - passed a law in 2003 permitting regents to raise tuition. And they have - every time the legislature cuts state funding to universities.

Now, Perry's putting UT-Austin in a vise - preventing it from raising tuition to cover losses in state funding.

Shouldn't the students be thanking Perry? Hardly. His regents gave a knee-jerk rejection to a tuition hike that Powers specifically earmarked for student aid and a plan to accelerate graduation rates.

'Serious consequences'

Both are badly needed. As Villarreal pointed out, the legislature also cut financial aid, leaving some 43,000 students without assistance.

Powers wrote on his blog that the regents' decision "will affect our ability to teach our students and make new discoveries" and warned the situation carried "serious consequences for UT Austin and for the ability of Texans to benefit from strong public universities."

Intolerance of dissent has marked Perry's administration. Shortly after becoming chairman of the UT board, San Antonio businessman Gene Powell admonished UT administrators to "remain positive" when speaking to lawmakers about proposed budget cuts. Apparently, he didn't care for Chancellor Francisco Cigarroa's frank assessment that the legislature's cuts would have "immediate and future devastating consequences."

Late Thursday, Cigarroa issued a denial that he'd been pressured to fire Powers, as Burka's report suggested. Then, someone using the name of a Perry political ally posted a comment that Powers should be fired for "insubordination."

A history lesson

There's one hope for Powers. If Perry fires him, he'll turn his enemy into an instant national hero. Advice to Perry staff members: Google the name "Homer Rainey." He's the University of Texas at Austin president fired in 1944 by the Board of Regents because he refused to get rid of several alleged Communists on the UT faculty. Eight thousand UT students marched on the Governor's Mansion. Seventy years may have passed, but college students still love a good protest rally in springtime.